The far right does not emerge outside mainstream political culture. Its nationalism, authoritarianism and populism draw on ideas with deep roots in Australian life.
Category: Immigration
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Migration is not the problem. Bad migration policy is
Migration brings benefits, pressures and vulnerabilities. The challenge is not choosing between open and closed borders, but building institutions capable of managing movement well. (more…)
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A future where Australian Muslims no longer question belonging
By 2050, a new generation of Australian Muslims will be shaping the country’s institutions, communities and public life, confident in their identity, belonging and contribution to Australia’s future. (more…)
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Debunking mass deportation hype
Both One Nation and the Coalition have been talking up their mass deportation target of around 75,000 – with zero details of how that would be implemented or what it would cost. Abul Rizvi looks beyond the hype. (more…)
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Anger and fear is real – but don’t blame migrants
Australia’s anger over housing, inequality and living costs is real, but blaming migration risks fuelling the populist politics of fear and division. (more…)
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Albanese inherited a migration mess. It is taking too long to fix it
Labor inherited a migration system burdened by asylum backlogs, temporary visa pressures and administrative failure. Four years later, the clean-up remains far from complete. (more…)
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Seven hours to prove he speaks English: Gaza students in visa limbo
Young Palestinians offered a place by Irish universities shouldn’t lose that future because the mechanisms of a visa system can’t accommodate the reality of the place from from which they are applying. (more…)
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Six things Tony Burke should say about immigration
Australia’s post-COVID migration surge is receding, but it exposed deep weaknesses in the temporary visa system. Restoring public confidence requires better regulation, clearer pathways and less fixation on a single net migration number. (more…)
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Twenty-five years after Tampa, Australia is still at sea
As Labor considers tougher migration measures amid pressure from One Nation and the Coalition, the legacy of Tampa still shapes how Australia treats refugees, asylum seekers and migrants. (more…)
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Migration targets need more than thought bubbles
Australia’s migration debate needs clear targets, credible delivery plans and honest discussion of the consequences – not caps that cannot work or promises that ignore visa backlogs. (more…)
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More immigration is a must, not an option
Australia needs a migration policy based on workforce reality, not populist fear, racial resentment or a political race to match One Nation’s impossible promises. (more…)
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Before we debate migration, we need to ask: who will care for Australia?
As Australia ages, the care workforce will depend on better training, stronger retention and skilled migration – not a narrow debate about population or monoculture. (more…)
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Australia is wasting the skills migrants bring
Almost half of skilled migrants are working below their qualification level, while Australia’s complex recognition system leaves urgently needed teachers, nurses, engineers and tradespeople underused. (more…)
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One Nation’s student visa plan would kill a $55 billion export industry
One Nation’s proposed visa cap and threat to deport students would devastate international education, put tens of thousands of jobs at risk and leave universities facing financial crisis. (more…)
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Seventy-five years on, the Refugee Convention still matters
At 75, the Refugee Convention remains a vital framework for protecting people fleeing persecution, but it needs renewed political will and international cooperation to work.
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Australia’s Japanese migrants are changing with Japan itself
Reflecting shifts in Japan itself, the face of Japanese migration is changing. Those coming to Australia are now motivated by a combination of aspiration, insecurity and risk. (more…)
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The World Cup is showing countries who they really are
The composition of teams in the World Cup suggests that modern national identity cannot be easily disentangled from colonialism, empire and migration. (more…)
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What the Socceroos taught us about belonging
The World Cup has shown Australia that our national identity is about diversity not uniformity. (more…)
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The new geography of migration is reshaping economic success
The world’s geography of migration is changing, and with it our understanding of economic development, national success and the role of public policy. (more…)
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Government is contorting itself on overseas students
High student visa refusal rates and extreme fee increases are blunt, haphazard tools for cutting net migration. Australia needs a long-term migration plan it can explain and defend. (more…)
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Migration is falling, but the politics keeps getting hotter
Net overseas migration is falling, but public concern is rising. Once migration is framed as a crisis, lower numbers alone will not defeat the politics built on fear. (more…)
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Who among us wasn’t once a newcomer?
Every Australian family was once the newcomer; some arrived generations ago, others arrived last week. Yet, every generation seems to forget that fact just in time to fear the next one. (more…)
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The World Cup asks what we mean by “we” – Message from the (acting) Editor
The World Cup is compromised, commercialised and often grotesque – but it can still show us something true about belonging, about multicultural Australia and the complexity of loving something, while refusing to look away from its failures. (more…)
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Football shows how belonging is built
The world game’s global appeal lies in its power to create belonging, shared experience and everyday social cohesion across cultures, reminding diverse societies that connection is built not only through policy, but through common stories.
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Where ‘we’ begins: the World Cup and multicultural Australia
The World Cup offers a simple answer to a complicated political debate: a nation is strongest when people with different pasts choose the same future. (more…)
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Living well together despite our differences
A diverse nation is held together not by embracing monoculture but by building familiarity and then trust. (more…)
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When Hanson starts fishing in multicultural waters
Pauline Hanson’s politics is finding new resonance because it turns real pressures over housing, services, tax and insecurity into a familiar politics of exclusion, offering some migrant-background voters the dangerous comfort of a place near the gate. (more…)
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Once refugees, now part of Australia’s story
Fifty years after the end of the Vietnam War, Vietnamese Australians are marking survival, settlement and contribution with a world-first museum in Melbourne dedicated to the refugee journeys that helped reshape multicultural Australia.
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Immigration debate needs facts, not inflated numbers
The latest ABS net migration figures expose the misuse of Net Permanent and Long-term movement data by media outlets and anti-immigration campaigners seeking to inflate claims about Australia’s migration intake. (more…)
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Stateless people need protection, not removal to Nauru
As the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee prepares to report tomorrow, Australia’s latest Nauru arrangement should be terminated because it deflects obligations to refugees and leaves stateless people facing prolonged legal limbo without durable protection.